This article examines the forces behind the wartime labor lawsuits against Japanese companies, focusing on the Seoul-based law firm Haemaru and its leading lawyer Jang Wan-ik. Based on the research of nonfiction writer Choi Seok-young, it explores the international networks linking Korean activists, Japanese left-wing organizations, and events such as the Women’s International War Crimes Tribunal.

2019-02-16.
I would like to focus on another core element of this series of incidents, namely the plaintiff-side law firm that is effectively “driving” the litigation, the organizations to which it belongs, and the networks connected to them.
A chapter published on 2018-12-20, titled “The ‘Wartime Labor’ Legal Team and the Japanese Communist Party,” introducing a paper by nonfiction writer Choi Seok-young, has now entered the top ten in Goo’s search rankings.
As I have repeatedly stated, the monthly magazines Hanada and WiLL released today are essential reading for all Japanese citizens.
Even if one subscribes to these two magazines together with Sound Argument and Voice, the total cost is still far cheaper than the monthly subscription fee for the Asahi Shimbun.
Those magazines are filled with genuine scholarly essays, whereas the Asahi Shimbun’s reporting has not only sunk to a kindergarten level—criticized even by scholars close to the paper itself—but has also long promoted a masochistic view of history and published countless stories that demean Japan to the point of resembling propaganda on behalf of China or the Korean Peninsula.
This includes Katsuichi Honda’s reporting on the Nanjing Massacre—work that he himself admits was written according to materials handed to him by the Chinese government after visiting locations arranged by that government—yet was nevertheless spread worldwide as fact.
It also includes the comfort-women reporting by Takashi Uemura, who married the daughter of a leading pro–North Korea sympathizer in South Korea—likely during the Asahi Shimbun’s customary in-house study program at Yonsei University—as well as the notorious fabricated coral-reef story.
There are also unbelievable fake news stories, such as the so-called Women’s International War Crimes Tribunal—organized by Yayori Matsui, the mother-in-law of Takashi Uemura, North Korean operatives, and Alexis Dudden—which NHK eagerly broadcast, accompanied by fabricated reporting by journalist Masakazu Honda.
In direct contrast to being forced to read endless essays by pseudo-moralists such as Kenzaburō Ōe, these magazines allow readers to learn the truth of matters.
In other words, they allow readers to read real journalism and real scholarly essays written by real scholars.
The latest issue of Hanada released today is filled with essays that all deserve to be read, but in particular, Choi Seok-young’s paper titled “The ‘Wartime Labor’ Legal Team and the Japanese Communist Party” should be required reading for all Japanese citizens.
Forces That “Directed” the Lawsuit.
In 2001, the “International Conference to Reconsider the Annexation of Korea,” attended by specialists from Japan, Korea, Europe, and the United States, was held three times—in Hawaii, Tokyo, and Boston.
At the third conference, prominent scholars participated, including Professor Lee Tae-jin of Seoul National University, Professor Lee Keun-kwan of Seoul University, Professor Kang Sung-eun of Chosun University representing Koreans in Japan, Professor Norikatsu Sasakawa of International Christian University, Professor Fukuju Umino of Meiji University, Professor John W. Dower of MIT, and Professor James Crawford of Cambridge University (North Korean scholars attended the first conference in Hawaii, but did not participate in the third conference in Boston due to the impact of the 9/11 attacks).
This conference was actively promoted by South Korea in order to draw an international conclusion that the annexation of Korea was illegal and illegitimate, and to publicize that conclusion worldwide.
South Korea aimed to use the conference as an opportunity to have the illegality of annexation recognized internationally, but the plan failed.
Neither Japan nor Western specialists supported the Korean claim that the annexation was illegal or that the treaty was invalid.
Until the conference, the Korean media had devoted significant space to it in anticipation, but in the face of the unexpected outcome, they ultimately toned down their coverage and introduced only brief, simplified articles.
Contrary to its original purpose, the conference ended up demonstrating the magnitude of the gap between Korea’s view and that of the outside world.
Nevertheless, South Korea has firmly maintained this “illegality theory,” applied it to the Nippon Steel lawsuit, and engraved it into the judgment itself.
“Illegal colonial rule”—that is the premise of this lawsuit.
Making a claim that failed to win agreement abroad into the premise of a judgment appears not so much to reflect an independent Korean decision as an attitude of pursuing its own path regardless of overseas opinion.
From the outset, there was no intention whatsoever to submit the matter to the International Court of Justice or to listen to the views of the international community.
In Japan, the plaintiffs’ backgrounds as former workers at Nippon Steel, interpretations of the ruling, the position of the Korean government, and Korean public opinion have already attracted attention and been reported in various ways.
Therefore, in this article I would like to focus on another core element of the case, namely the plaintiff-side law firm that is effectively “driving” the litigation, the organizations to which it belongs, and the networks connected to them.
The Law Firm “Haemaru.”
The party relentlessly pursuing lawsuits on behalf of the plaintiffs against Nippon Steel is the Seoul-based law firm “Haemaru.”
Haemaru is a mid-sized law firm established in 1992 by liberal-leaning lawyers such as Cheon Jeong-bae and Lim Jong-in.
It currently has a little more than twenty lawyers, and among them are several individuals with noteworthy backgrounds.
Perhaps the most famous figure among lawyers who came out of Haemaru is former President Roh Moo-hyun.
Before becoming president, Roh worked in the Busan region as a “human rights lawyer” alongside figures such as Moon Jae-in, but he ran in the 1992 National Assembly election and lost.
During his years as a would-be politician from 1993 to 1998, he worked as a lawyer at Haemaru.
Roh came to be connected with Haemaru after tasting defeat and falling into discouragement, when attorney Cheon Jeong-bae—his colleague and supporter—recommended that he join the firm (Cheon Jeong-bae was later appointed Minister of Justice under the Roh Moo-hyun administration).
Haemaru has an image of being strong in “international litigation,” including compensation lawsuits against Japanese companies, but if we observe the organization anew, we can begin to see “pipes” to Japan that had previously gone unnoticed.
The first person we must pay attention to is Jang Wan-ik, who as Haemaru’s lead attorney effectively directed the wartime labor lawsuits.
He joined Haemaru in 1993, and around 1994 he became known as a lawyer handling work for the Korean civic group that supports comfort women, “Chŏngdaehyŏp.”
In 2000 he was involved in Japan-related lawsuits such as the case against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, and in 2005 he was involved in wartime labor cases against Nippon Steel and Nachi-Fujikoshi.
However, the reason his name became known in Japan as well was likely the Women’s International War Crimes Tribunal held in Tokyo in 2000, organized by the Violence Against Women in War Network Japan (VAWW-NET).
At that tribunal, he served as a prosecutor on the Korean side.
This tribunal was a kind of mock court—an event in which prosecutors were formed mainly by civic groups, human rights lawyers, and scholars from South Korea, North Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Indonesia, and other places, and in which a “verdict” was handed down on whether Japan was guilty or not guilty in the Pacific War.
The Lead Attorney and the South Korea United Confederation.
That Jang participated in this mock tribunal was, in a sense, only natural.
The event was organized by former Asahi Shimbun reporter Yayori Matsui and by Yoon Jeong-ok, the former head of Chŏngdaehyŏp in South Korea.
It is rather “natural” that a Chŏngdaehyŏp lawyer would participate in an event organized by the head of Chŏngdaehyŏp.
In that tribunal, allied forces from various countries declared that the Emperor and the Japanese state were guilty of “crimes against humanity regarding rape and the system of sexual slavery,” and issued a guilty verdict.
Although it was a “mock trial” with no legal effect, it was a trial that succeeded, at least in South Korea, in powerfully imprinting the image that “Japan = war criminals.”
Jang Wan-ik, who participated as a prosecutor in this leftist “festival,” has now stepped away from the front lines of the litigation, entrusting the practical work of the Nippon Steel lawsuit he had previously led to junior lawyers at Haemaru, in order to devote himself to his role as chair of the “Special Investigation Commission on Social Disasters,” to which he was appointed by the Moon Jae-in administration.
However, the fact that Haemaru’s lead attorney had been connected with left-wing forces inside Japan for roughly twenty years is an important point in interpreting the current lawsuits.
To be continued.